Ten years of Mayday Parade

Just over ten years ago, there was this band at the Warped Tour. They weren't even playing, but they were walking around introducing themselves to everyone and selling their CD. They were the happiest, sweetest, most positive guys, and you couldn't help but fall in love with them and hand over your money.

When their debut album 'A Lesson in Romantics' hit the airwaves, it was literally like magic. Every person who heard them couldn't stop listening. Their gut-wrenching lyrics and intensely beautiful sound worked its way right into you, took hold, and ten years later still won't let go.

Last night, Mayday Parade hit the Portland stop of the ten year anniversary tour along with Knuckle Puck, a pop punk band from Chicago, and Milestones, a pop-punk band who joined the tour all the way from England, and not one of them disappointed.

Lead singer of Milestones.
Photo by Sunshine O'Connor

Milestones walked out on that stage and warmed up the crowd with ease. Knuckle Puck...well, the crowd went wild, and I was in the very front dodging crowd surfers and jumping with everything I had to give them. For Mayday Parade, I hung back because I wanted for the first time to experience them with space to dance and not worrying about who was going to land on my head.

They delivered a show that made us dance, sing, scream, and even cry.

As many of you know, I battled cancer at the end of 2016. Mayday Parade has a gut wrenching song about love and dying called Terrible Things, which was banned from my playlist from the moment I was diagnosed until this week when I decided I better not hear it live for the first time since its banishment. Even still, when the lights went down and it was just Derek Sanders and his guitar and he played those first notes, I lost it. I literally felt like my face was melting off, but then they dove right back into rocking out, and the day was saved.

The crowd was an even mix of people who fell in love with Mayday Parade as Warped Tour veterans as well as those who played their songs on repeat in middle school. I look forward to the next ten years.

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